Wigan high rise tenant blasts council over "horrendous" living conditions

Peter Kay has accused Wigan Council of leaving him in a Douglas House flat for months with a leaking bathroom and kitchen, as well as mould and damp in the front room.

He says no fewer than eight complaints have been made to the local authority, both by himself and by friends on his behalf, and that visits by contractors to his home have been completely ineffective.

The town hall, though, has strongly rebuffed some of Mr Kay’s complaints, saying it has dealt with problems where they have arisen.

It did, though, admit there were still problems with leaks, but scheduled work should fix them.

Mr Kay says he has been complaining about the state of his flat since last October, and claimed one engineer who turned up thought the problem was merely that his bathroom required new lightbulbs.

The 59-year-old said: “It is horrible how I have been living. The ceiling is leaking in the bathroom, which is dangerous with the electrics in there, and now it’s going into the kitchen.

“One engineer came and all he did was change the lightbulb. I couldn’t believe it.

“This has been going on for months. Another engineer told me they couldn’t understand where the leak was coming from.

“It’s very embarrassing. There are tiny flies everywhere and in my front room it’s all gone damp and mouldy.

“At the end of the day I shouldn’t be living like this and shouldn’t have been for all these months. I’m on medication as well. This is no way to live.”

Wigan Council said it hoped all the problems in Mr Kay’s flat would be solved very soon through planned improvement works in the building.

Dave Lyon, assistant director of environment at Wigan Council, said: “We are currently undergoing a large programme of works to replace bathrooms in our homes, and Douglas House is on that programme, so Mr Kay will soon receive a new bathroom which should fix this problem.

"Each time Mr Kay has reported something to us we have visited his property and fixed it.”

Mr Lyon added: “We have also arranged some further plastering works for him elsewhere in the property which will resolve the other issues.”